On the Textus Receptus

Some very helpful recent resources:

Ward also has written a brilliant article with a title worth asking anyone who wants to talk about ‘the Textus Receptus’: Which Textus Receptus?

See also this related article by Elijah Hixson which points out that there are at least 6 editions of the TR which lack the Comma Johanneum (1 John 5:7) – including the one that served as the basis for Luther’s German translation of the Bible.

I’ve previously linked to James White’s debate with Jeff Riddle. The discussion below with him and Stephen Boyce is also very helpful: they cover Luke 2:22; Eph 3:9; 1 John 5:7 and maybe one or two others.

Boyce also has some helpful articles:

Update: Some more resources:

Providential Preservation

The debate above (Part 1 is also available) is a good example of the weakness of the claim that WCF 1.8 ‘kept pure in all ages’ must refer to the Textus Receptus. (Something that some of its advocates are now referring to as ‘Confessional Bibliology’).

For context, Gurry holds to the Critical Text (NA28, UBS5, THGNT etc), Snapps (largely) to the Byzantine Text, and Riddle is TR-only. Riddle recently debated James White, arguing against the weight of manuscript evidence on one text, and arguing from it on the other – as he must interpret all evidence in light of the TR.

One of the main takeaways from the debate is that those who claim that ‘pure’ cannot include variants (and hence some level of uncertainty & the need to make decisions) are thinking about an era where we have the printing press, rather than an era where all people had was manuscripts, and no two were the same. (And obviously ‘kept pure in all ages’ cannot mean that everyone, in every part of the world, has had access to it in all ages).

As Gurry says in his wonderful closing statement, we can either recognise the variants and make decisions on them like Jerome and Erasmus did. Or we can pretend they don’t exist / implicitly trust decisions that others have made, despite the evidence against them.

Reading the Confession in Context

The key thing is that we need to read the Confession in context – as this helpful post by Gurry at the ETC blog reminds us.. The WCF wasn’t written in a vacuum – they were responding to arguments of the day. They weren’t discussing TR v Critical Text. Their concern was actually Hebrew/Greek v Latin.

As Turretin puts it (below), the existence of scribal errors in Greek manuscripts didn’t mean that rather than appealing to the Greek, the only appeal could be to the Roman Catholic Church / Latin Vulgate. As Whitaker reminds us (link in Gurry article), Trent had defined the Latin to be authentic:

“Although our adversaries do not condemn the Hebrew and Greek originals, yet they conclude that not these originals, but the vulgate Latin edition is the authentic text of Scripture”. A Disputation on Holy Scripture, p. 111.

Some other useful quotes:

Turretin:

‘The Protestants distinguished between variant readings and corruptions. Variant readings were usually seen as unintentional scribal errors; corruptions were viewed as intentional modifications to the text. They admitted variant readings in the texts, but denied that the text had been corrupted (or at least not universally corrupted). Francis Turretin, Institutes of Elenctic Theology (3 vols.; trans. George M. Giger; ed. James T. Dennison, Jr.; Phillipsburg, NJ: P&R, 1992), 1:111; Walton, The Considerator Considered, 14, 292.

The question was not whether there were variant readings, as all admitted them. “Rather the question,” states Turretin, “is have the original texts (or the Hebrew and Greek manuscripts) been so corrupted either by copyists through carelessness (or by the Jews and heretics through malice) that they can no longer be regarded as the judge of controversies and the rule to which all the version must be applied? The papists affirm, we deny.” Turretin, Institutes of Elenctic Theology, 1:106.’

Owen:

“There is no doubt but that in the copies we now enjoy of the Old Testament there are some diverse readings…But yet we affirm, that the whole Word of God, in every letter and tittle, as given from him by inspiration, is preserved without corruption. Where there is any variety it is always in things of less, indeed of no, importance. God by his providence preserving the whole entire, suffered this lesser variety to fall out, in or among the copies we have, for the quickening and exercising of our diligence in our search into his Word.” (Vol 16, p. 301)

Rutherford:

“The old and new Testament in the way they come to us may be fallible, because Printers are not prophets but may miscarry and dreame; but it followeth not they are not the infallible word of life in themselves, when the Spirit witnesseth to us that God, divinitie, transforming glory are in these books

…though there be errours of number, genealogies, &c., of writing in the Scripture, as written or printed, yet we hold providence watcheth so over it, that in the body of articles of faith, and necessary truths, we are certaine with the certainty of faith, it is that same very word of God.”

A free disputation against pretended liberty of conscience, quoted in Gribben, ‘Samuel Rutherford and Liberty of Conscience’, WTJ 71 (2009).

An Introduction to the Greek New Testament, Produced at Tyndale House, Cambridge

An Introduction to the Greek New Testament, Produced at Tyndale House, Cambridge
Dirk Jongkind
Crossway, 2019

The Greek New Testament, Produced at Tyndale House, Cambridge (short title Tyndale House Edition, abbreviated as THGNT) was released in 2017. The most well-known name associated with it is Peter J Williams. This is a 120 page introduction to the particular features of that edition – though it also answers bigger questions, about how we got the Bible, what textual criticism involves, etc. Although ‘through the ages the existence of textual variants has been seen as a danger to, or an argument against, the notion of the divine nature of the Scriptures’, Jongkind disagrees. The book is concise, though most of it is probably aimed at seminary level and above.

In terms of the manuscripts, Jongkind believes ‘no single textual family has preserved the best wording of the text’. A chapter entitled ‘Why not the Received Text?’, makes a number of helpful points. Firstly, Jongkind identifies this as a uniquely Protestant problem, saying ‘I don’t know of any Christians within Eastern Orthodoxy or Roman Catholicism who defend the Textus Receptus’. He also points out that ‘Accepting the Textus Receptus as the authoritative text of the New Testament means that one accepts the printed text of the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. In practice, this means that even if the Textus Receptus offers a text not found in any Greek manuscript dating from before the published editions, still the Greek text of a printed edition is accepted. An example is Revelation 22:19: the Textus Receptus has βίβλου τῆς ζωῆς, “book of life,” instead of ξύλου τῆς ζωῆς, “tree of life,” as all Greek manuscript evidence testifies’. He then goes on to answer the question ‘So why are defenders of the Textus Receptus willing to go against all preserved evidence?’

Jongkind uses an Old Testament example to argue that God’s Word ‘has always been available to the church, though sometimes with more clarity than at other times. This is even illustrated in the biblical history itself. Who knew the details of the law in the days immediately before the rediscovery of the scroll in the temple during Josiah’s reign (2 Kings 22)? As far as the historical evidence suggests, not everyone has had access at all times to the perfect, original wording of the New Testament’.

An introduction to a Greek New Testament obviously isn’t for everyone. It’s also quite expensive for what it is. But for a conservative evangelical, and yet bang up-to-date, approach to textual criticism, it is well worth having. A good alternative for the layperson would be Peter J William’s Can we trust the gospels?

Thanks to Crossway for a complimentary copy of this book through their Beyond the Page review programme.

Textual Criticism for Dummies

One issue that we can’t ignore when it comes to the Bible is that sometimes those using certain Bible versions have extra words, and occasionally verses and even passages that most Bible versions don’t have. This difference is due to the different Greek manuscripts that the translations are based on.

Often debates about this can get emotive and heated – especially when the ‘missing’ words are claimed to have a special importance. One less emotive passage however is in Colossians 1v2: ‘To the saints and faithful brothers in Christ at Colossae: Grace to you and peace from God our Father.’

That’s from the ESV – some translations however add the words – ‘and the Lord Jesus Christ’, which fits with how Paul starts his other letters. Why do they do that? Or should they always have been there in the first place?

In the sermon below (from just before the 18 minute mark), Dave Reese sets out the problem and explains how we can know which is right.